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Happy Birthday, Mozilla!
Deven writes "Happy birthday, Mozilla! The Lizard is two years old today. We may not be there quite yet, but Mozilla has come a long way since March 31, 1998... " Hmmm...Marilyn Manson and Mozilla - that'd be a great birthday shot.
I ask this seriously. What is so hard about writing a browser? I see how long it takes, how many people it takes and how few browser projects survive. Its obviously hard, but why?
There are a lot of ways to make money by giving software (not just the binaries, but code) availiable for free - here's a few I can think of:
1) Give away free software, then charge for custom modifications/support. This is the easiest to understand - if you help to write something really good then you'll be set for life through as many support contracts as you want to take on.
2) Give away free software that utilizes some resource you sell. For instance, a telecom company might develop and give away some really cool custom videoconferencing software in order to encourage customers to use more bandwith.
3) Give away free software to prove how amazing you are. Under this model, one could use free software to build a portfolio of demonstrable talent to use when seeking consulting contracts. Wouldn't you like to be able to see some code a consultant has worked on before you hire them? Wouldn't you pay a bit extra for that priviledge?
4) Give away free software to build up demand for skills in an area you have expertise in. Similar to, but quite different than #1 - in the case of #1 you are trying to build a wonderful boat in the hope you'll be hired on as part of the crew (terrible analogy, sorry). In this case though, you are trying to add water to the ocean to raise the area everyone gets to sail in. A lot of OSS people profit in this way, in that demand for knowledge of OSS type things (like Linux/BSD skils or the ability to integrate various OSS software into a company) has greatly increased. Even if that was not the goal (and I don't think it was) it's still a benefit.
5) Give away free software, that contains subliminal suggestions to wire money to a certain swiss bank account. This has been unsuccessful so far only because most people have unwittingly chosen a refresh rate of 50-60Hz (at those rates, Hurtz is really a descriptive term!) not offering enough frames to effectivley deliver the message. Those running at 90Hz+ drink enough Mtn. Dew that they end up blinking fast enough to pretty much block the messages. Plus of course with the software being open source the account number is constanly being altered, so at most you end up with $10. Oh well, who said there's no such thing as a free lunch?
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
i'm a "soft-techie". i'm basically a geek turned suit; i'm also an economist and practical techno-business person. i am not an open source zealot, but i can tell you that the reason i do think that open source is the way of the future is b/c ours is a service-based economy. a few years ago, the US economy was product based. today, we are 60% product based and growing. don't believe me? who do you think makes a bigger profit margin? dell or anderson consulting? if products were so profitable, when why do we see more and more companies giving away products (computers, cell phones, etc...) for free, but charging for service?
open sourcing a software product allows people who ultimately sell services (like red hat's support) to make a bigger profit on their services by sharing the costs of a product, and ultimately offering a better product.
today, products are pretty much commodity items. seriously, what is the BIG difference between dell computers and gateway2000 computers. it's all about the marketing and customer support. did you knokw that car dealerships no longer compete based on price, but based on customer support? it's true.
that's why open source works, why it's the way of the future, and why people WILL make money giving something away for free.
it's just that it's software, and thus something different. when you get down to it, there is nothing too different from giving away software for free and charging for service (like support) and giving away cell phones for free and charging for the connection fees. just as a cell phone is USELESS without service, to a large corporation, linux isn't all that useful without massive support as well. (i'm not talking about a few developers using linux as their private operating system; i'm talking about a large coprotation clustering 40 - 50 servers all running linux and serving out web-based, custom-built applications.)
questions? comments? email me!
i want to live life, not just go through the motions
If you want to see the new "throbber" for the netscape-branded version of the browser, go to that mozillazine article with the screenshots. The GIF is at the very bottom. Looks pretty cool, eh?
-JD
Geeky.org || All Things Geek
I have been using Mozilla since way back in the day. I remember when it could not render the front page of Nvidia.com.... then it was close.. and now its on the money!
There has been a whole lot of good things happen! In the past few months i get nightly builds for my linux system and it runs awesome! IN the time I was using XFree 3.9.17 it was the only browser i could use.. NetScape for some reason would not work!!! And i got to like it a lot!! I really think that they have done a lot better than I think most ppl. would have thought!!
Great going Mozilla.... and may Netscape 6 be renamed in your honor!! I mean it really makes no sense to have Netscape 6 be the new name!!! call it Mozilla MileStone 2000.
Hmm So where is party going to be ? ?
Non-Deterministic Finite Automata
I don't get it. Lots of slashdot users have replied to my comments on this article, telling me that the only way to "contribute" to open source is to write code. That I'm not really contributing to mozilla by finding and reporting "bugs": security holes that have existed for several browser versions but are taken for granted, minor user-interface quirks, and requests for the interface to be more customizable and more friendly. At the same time, the slashdot community is frustrated by the lack of good user interfaces in open source software.
Is there any chance that this attitude about "contribution" is a part of the reason why interfaces of open-source programs often suck?
--
The shareholder is always right.
I believe Mozilla is a pun on the name Mosaic. Mosaic was the first widely used graphical browser. It was written largely by Mark Andresson, who went on to work on Netscape. So, take Mosaic, and combine it with Godzilla (for big, and powerful, and general ass-kicking) and you get Mozilla, which was the name sent in the user agent string for Netscape, and, I would assume, the internal name for the browser.
Mosaic got modified by Spyglass, and Spyglass Mosaic was the starting point for IE, so the two major browsers started with Mark Andreesson. IE was never "Mozilla", but it sent Mozilla as it's user-agent string because it was pretty much compatible.
--Kevin
Has it ever occurred to you how Netscape was rubbed in the dirt by Microsoft (of course it has) and how they (and the people cuurently working at the Mozilla project) are trying to gain the lost grounds? When topic = The Mozilla project, then the debate should be open for a few relevant questions. Problem is, the ideals behind Mozilla are so high that any posed question will inevidently sound like I'm brewing up a conspiracy theory. Anyway, here goes:
- Why is the Open Source phenomenon booming the way is? Could it have anything to do with the fact that the hours spent on designing it are relatively free of charge (of course it has)? Does this have anything at all to do with a general tendency towards glorifying anything Open Source? In other words, why is it a cool thing to participate in anything that's Open Source? And does this again have anything to do with the fact that the term 'Open Source' has been commercialized (you must agree it is, really - remember the Save Iridium project a few days ago). - ? Was Open Sourcing Mozilla the only way Netscape could stay alive? (think about how much publicity it has brought about).
I'm not being offensive, just trying to dig to the core of things. And of course the one question which dismisses all the above as a load of crap is this: What does it all matter as long as the users are in control?
Still, please think about it. I'm puzzled, as I'm not exactly a techie myself... does it make sense?
www.e.magazine.dk
http://www.mozilla.org/party/2000/flyer.html has details about the party celebrating the N6B1.
To all the hard working programers that have helped to build the lizard over the years: Thank You and have fun!
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